Tree ring cross dating

Archaeologists sometimes study the ring patterns in beams or other pieces of wood from archaeological sites to help date the sites; they may also study the ring patterns to infer the local climatic history.

Douglass (1920) illustrated the relationship between climate and ring width by plotting both against time, and introduced the technique of cross dating by correlating ring-width signatures (sequences of wide and narrow rings) among trees distributed over large areas.

Ring width in both species was significantly correlated with air temperature during the preceding summer.

Potential physiological explanations for these results are discussed.

The banding patterns on the cores correspond to a close-up view of the cross section of a tree.

This item is part of the Tree-Ring Research (formerly Tree-Ring Bulletin) archive.